Senior Coledon Bethel on Thursday, October 19th ran his best cross country race of his two year career to punch his ticket to the 2018 state qualifying meet in Fort Dodge on October 27th. Coledon’s career and season best time of 17:33 was 9th overall on the course in Garner. Trying to join him in the state meet was fellow senior Ben Carlson who also ran a career best of 18:19 for 21st place, missing out on 15th place and a state bid by 18 seconds. The top 15 athletes qualify for the state meet.

Joining Coledon and Ben for the Jaguars were Robert Jepsen, 63rd and a career best of 19:57 followed by Zach Thompson who was 77th in 20:26. Isaiah Gibbs (87th) and Caleb Kaltschnee (95th) both ran season best times of 20:53 and 21:32 respectively. Asa Haub (94th) edged out Caleb at the finish in a time of 21:30.

The boys’ team scored 257 points to finish 10th overall in the 15 team field. Okoboji, 84 points, Grundy Center/Gladbrook Reinbeck with 94 points and South Hardin with 95 points were the top three state qualifying teams at the meet.

The top finisher for Southeast Valley on the girls’ side was senior Alli True who finished 21st in a season best time of 22:09, 40 seconds behind 15th place. Fellow senior Katara Jondle was 28th and Marlie Johnson 69th both with season best times of 22:27 and 25:21 respectively. Morgan Farnham (67th, 25:19), Hannah Rees (78th, 26:07), Sammy Alphs (80th, 26:19) and Emily Hemmestad (84th, 27:04) helped the Jaguars to a 10th place finish overall as well.

The top three teams and state qualifiers in the girls race were Crestwood with 64 points, Waukon with 73 points and Aplington Parkersburg with 96 points.

“I’m proud with how our athletes competed on Thursday. We knew we had a tough state qualifying meet this year and we had talked about how if anybody would have a chance to qualify, we were going to have to have some big PRs. Several of our athletes went out and did that, unfortunately, it was a tough enough meet that only Coledon qualified for state,” commented Coach Nuss. “State qualifying meet is always a bittersweet night. You get to celebrate those who make it to state, but you also realize that for most of the athletes the season is over and for the seniors, their careers are over. When you work with the quality of student athletes that we do, that makes it tough to say goodbye.”

Coledon will run at 1:30pm on Saturday, October 27th at Lakeside Golf Course/Kennedy park in Fort Dodge. The state meet actually begins at 11am with the 4A races. Note for spectators, there will be NO spectator parking at or around Kennedy Park this year due to recent flooding and storms. Spectators are asking to park at Harlan Rodgers, Fort Dodge Middle School or Fort Dodge High School and there will be shuttles running back and forth to get spectators to the course. More information for parking can be found at www.iahsaa.org.